Cooperation between threads

C# Essentials
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As you ve seen, when you use threads to run more than one task at a time, you can keep one task from interfering with another task s resources by using a mutex to synchronize the behavior of the two tasks. That is, if two tasks are stepping on each other over a shared resource (usually memory), you use a mutex to allow only one task at a time to access that resource.

With that problem solved, you can move on to the issue of getting threads to cooperate, so that multiple threads can work together to solve a problem. Now the issue is not about interfering with one another, but rather about working in unison, since portions of such problems must be solved before other portions can be solved. It s much like project planning: the footings for the house must be dug first, but the steel can be laid and the concrete forms can be built in parallel, and both of those tasks must be finished before the concrete foundation can be poured. The plumbing must be in place before the concrete slab can be poured, the concrete slab must be in place before you start framing, and so on. Some of these tasks can be done in parallel, but certain steps require all tasks to be completed before you can move ahead.

The key issue when tasks are cooperating is handshaking between those tasks. To accomplish this handshaking, we use the same foundation: the mutex, which in this case guarantees that only one task can respond to a signal. This eliminates any possible race conditions. On top of the mutex, we add a way for a task to suspend itself until some external state changes ( the plumbing is now in place ), indicating that it s time for that task to move forward. In this section, we ll look at the issues of handshaking between tasks, the problems that can arise, and their solutions.